Talk:On Delta Station

Designing Units

The art of unit design is a key part of Anno Ether, as very few military (or for that matter, civilian!) units are the same. The system that AE uses consists of several parts:

• 1) The unit base: This is the most fundamental element, as all units are something. A unit base includes basic functionality and can perform in its role; unit bases are also entirely unexceptional and represent what is generally considered minimum capabilities. Thus a capital ship would have armor to resist shellfire and a fighter would be able to fly and engage other aircraft. The unit base also determines the basic cost of the unit, as well as any cost multipliers or production batch size (one 'unit' of infantry being 10,000 actual soldiers, for example).
• 2) Milieu and Aptitudes: All states have developed different approaches to technology and magic (and technomagic and magitech), not to mention different best practices and doctrines. All of these are holistically represented by Aptitudes which are a set of baked-in improvements to military units. For example, a state with Propulsion Aptitude 1 has invested some effort into improving their engines and can coax more power out of them, while a different state with the same aptitude at 2 is definitely at the forefront of engine technologies and one with it at 3 is a world-beater. The specific aptitudes are determined by Milieu.
• 3) Technical Level (TL): This is a measure of how many different things you can cram into a unit and still have it function more or less as designed. It is different from Aptitudes, as you may not be very good at actually building high-efficiency cosmoturbines and hyper-compressed bolt cannons but if you have a high technic level you're a whiz at integrating all sorts of disparate systems and making them actually work together painlessly.
• 4) Added/Reduced Capabilities: This is the true nuts and bolts of unit design and what distinguishes a Mark I Light Mech from a Mark X Assault Atlas. Units have a limited number of added capabilities slots (your TL), and each added capability has a numerical rating, from 1 (small improvement) to 5 (enormous improvement). Each pip is equivalent to one point of Aptitude. Some capabilities are not rated in levels; these are generally rated at 2 pips each for cost purposes but do take up one slot each. Reduced capabilities act the opposite way, greatly reducing the relevant attribute. Generally speaking going beyond 2 pips of reduced capability in any field is crippling in some fashion; an artillery piece at -2 mobility might be a towed gun, but -3 mobility means that it is tactically immobile and needs to be set up and taken down, at -4 it is a fixed turret on a permanent foundation. For every two different reduced capabilities taken, you may build a unit as if it were one TL higher.

Example

Mk I Light Mech (TL3 Armor)

Aptitudes: 2 Armor, 2 Gun, 1 Mobility

+1 Mobility

Mk X Assault Atlas (TL3 Armor)

Aptitudes: 2 Armor, 2 Gun, 1 Mobility

+5 Armor

+3 Cannon

+3 Articulated Fists

-1 Mobility

The Assault Atlas has three added capabilities and one reduced capability, but as it is a TL3 unit it cannot take any more added capabilities. It can, if desired, upgrade all the way to +5 cannon and +5 articulated fists but this would certainly come with a cost premium.

Cost commentary
Currently I'm envisioning rank 1-2 being one cost, then a premium at rank 3-4, and then a larger premium at rank 5. I am also currently allowing 'broadening' your caps, so you could have +2 guns and +2 guns at the lower price. Obviously this cuts into how many different caps you can have, so it naturally balances efficient single-role designs against breadth of capabilities.

Unit Grid

Base Unit	Heavy Metal	Sword and Starship	Infospace
Scout Group
Fighter		Snubfighter
Interceptor
Striker	Tankbuster		Interdictor
Dominance Fighter	Superheavy Fighter	Variable Fighters	Multirole Fighter
Bomber
Heavy Bomber	Liberator		Strategic Bomber
Superbomber
Utility
Vertol
Patroller

Base Unit	Heavy Metal	Sword and Starship	Infospace
Escort	Tin Can	Warbird
Cruiser		Volleyship	Strike Cruiser
Capital Ship		Battlefrigate
Light Carrier
Fleet Carrier		Battlecarrier	Attack Carrier
Misc	Supercapital		Fast Attack Prowler
Battlefortress

Heritage Ships and Refits

Buggy Software: Nice bonuses, but random chance every turn that it'll bug out and invert the bonuses to penalties.